Finding Your Way
by Fuhzeh
Summary: Inspired by "Out of Body, Out of Mind" by Crazyeight. Takato Matsuki finds himself as an Agumon paired up with none other than Tai Kamiya! Thrown into a new adventure he knows nothing about, can he defeat the new foe and get back into his original body?
1. It begins

**AN: **And so it begins. With school being out, I've been doing quite a bit of reading on the site and ran across quite a few that I love. One particular story by Crazyeight had such an interesting concept that it was a shame that he doesn't update it. Or at least I think he isn't updating it. Don't get me wrong, I love his other stories as well and I find myself re-reading quite a few of em but I just couldn't resist taking his story "Out of Body, Out of Mind" and running all the possible scenarios in my head as though I was waiting for the next episode to come out. When it looked like he took a break after completely his more famous epic "Tamer's Requiem" (yes I know people need breaks but I'm impatient), I finally gave up hope of the story being updated soon and came out of my lurking to give fanfiction a try. While the initial concept remains the same, you'll notice that this isn't a season 3/5 crossover but rather 2/3. The reason for this is quite simple. I don't hate the 5th season but I have never actually seen it. Even with the bits I picked up from this site here and there, there's no way I'm gonna be able to add enough detail to make a story out of it. Besides, this might be a good thing since keeping everything the same might be too much of a rip off of Crazyeights original story.

Digimon and all its characters aren't mine and yada yada yada.

Are these disclamers really even necessary?

* * *

He woke up to a cool breeze brushing against his body. To most people going about their day doing who knows what, this would have been a wonderful sensation, but to the sleeping boy, it just told him that it was drafty and he probably left the window open.

Too lazy to do anything about it, or even open his eyes for that matter, Takato Matsuki rolled over to his other side only to come upon his second revelation.

He was lying on grass.

Immediately Takato's eyes shot open expecting to find his bed and in extension, his room, but instead found wide open plains littered with grass. As he slowly sat upright, one could almost hear the gears in his head turning to process the information. The dazed boy looked up to see a clear blue sky with a few flurry clouds instead of his bland white ceiling. In front of him was a large, serene pond instead of his closet.

"Did I fall asleep at the park or something?"

Turning his head to take in the details for a second time, the tamer quickly realized that this wasn't the case. First of all, Takato could've drawn a map of the park blindfolded after all the meetings and experiences he had there. This place on the other hand, was completely alien to him. Secondly, the place just had a certain feeling to it. After mulling over his thoughts, he finally placed it on the fact that the place looked _too _nice to be in Shinjuku. Heck, a place this nice probably doesn't exist in Japan period. Not that he hated the landscape of his own country, but rather it seemed like something out of a fairytale. No misplaced dirt, no random branches on the ground, no nothing. The place was absolutely untouched and gorgeous.

Standing up brought about another interesting fact. Since the moment he woke up, a nice breeze fluttered throughout the fields, adding to the whole "serene" feeling the place gave off, but now Takato noticed that he felt the breeze _throughout his whole body_.

His face snapped down in alarm, completely expecting to find himself nude and in for an extraordinarily embarrassing experience, what he found instead, was a short orange body where his own was supposed to be. Most noticeably, the large claws extending out of his feet, or what should be his feet.

Confusion spreading through his head once again, the poor gears in his head were practically screeching from being overworked twice in such a short span of time.

"Okay, that definitely shouldn't be there", he said to no one in particular.

Slowly walking up to the pond, Takato began to look down into his own reflection, pausing a moment realizing that he might be afraid of what he'd find. The face that looked back was most definitely not his face yet was one he recognized immediately. His body was completely orange and almost simplistic, attached to over sized hands and feet (if he could call them hands and feet). The limbs were further attached to large and somewhat menacing claws. A long orange snout portruded from his head. His head itself was angular with green eyes on completely opposite sides of his head, similar to dinosaur.

Yes too similar to a dinosaur, and a recognizable one at that.

Staring at his own reflection for what seemed like hours, the conclusion finally sputtered out of his mouth as though he was making an awkward confession to a girl.

"I-I'm an Agum-m-mon". The poor digimon turned boy, still understandably in shock, continued to stare at his claws. "What happened? How did this happen? How is this even possible?", the former gogglehead, in his confusion, continuously spouted questions until finally calming down by taking another look at his new image in the water.

"Okay think, if I'm a digimon then this is probably the digital world." Looking around for the third time, Takato made a quick comparison.

"This looks nothing like the digital world! Wheres the wasteland! The crazy data streams! The packets of data!" His anxiety growing with each word, he quickly took a breath, effectively calming himself down again and began thinking.

"Me and the others have been through enough weird situations to deal with this …....... That's it! Maybe Henry or Rika are nearby. If I'm here, maybe everyone will be here. I just gotta find em and we'll find out what the hecks going on!"

With that thought, Takato quickly broke into a mad dash in a random direction, only to end up tripping over his new legs. The leader of the tamers has never been known for his grace as a human and his new claws certainly wasn't helping him gain any bearings.

With a grunt, he fell onto a soft cushion of grass, mentally noting to get used to his temporary body. Or at least he hoped it was temporary. As cool as it was seeing his childhood iconic hero, Takato always wanted to be partners with one. Actually becoming an Agumon physically, although an interesting thought, never quite crossed his mind.

"Well, if I can feel pain, at least I know this isn't a dream. Not that it makes me feel any better."

His one sided conversation was abruptly cut short when he heard a rustling in the trees. Glancing over, he noticed a figure hidden in the shade of the foliage, quickly making his way over to the open fields. The newly turned Agumon froze in its place, trying to discern the new entity as he silently prayed to no one in particular that it wouldn't try to eat him.

Soon enough, a large beetle like digimon that Takato recognized as Kuwagamon, emerged. The first thing Kuwagamon did was look down at the trembling rookie. Takato stared back at the champion level with well placed fear. Although he never actually met any in his own experiences, a Kuwagamon had never made a friendly appearance in the show. "But hey, that's just a cartoon right? Maybe this ones nice."

The staring contest between the two lasted a bit longer. In an attempt to break the awkward silence and save himself from a heart attack caused by the tension, the smaller of the two spoke up.

"So... uh....... nice weather we're having huh?"

"RAWWWWRRRRRRR."

"AWWW NUTS.", was all Takato had time to say before breaking into another sprint in the opposite direction. This attempt ended as poorly as the last one as he toppled over his own feet as quickly as he stood up. The experience would have been much more humiliating if his sense of fear didn't completely overwhelm everything else at the moment.

Before turning back to look at his assailant, Takato noticed more figures in the distance running towards his directions. Still he didn't exactly have the time to process this new bit as he turned back just in time to see the red bug rushing at him with its huge pincers. Shutting his eyes as tight as he could while waiting for the inevitable, Takato felt a new instinct bubbling up in his throat. Having nothing left to lose, he let it take control.

"Pepper Blast!" With a shout, the orange digimon let loose a fireblast. As it came out, Takato noticed that it had more differences from the original Pepper Breath attack than just it's name. The original Agumon's pepper breath wasn't quite that intimidating, comparable to Patamon's boom bubble with the exception that it was wreathed in flames. Now that he mentioned it, none of the chosen's rookie digimon were as intimidating as the tamer's, Takato realized. In the show, it was mainly about levels vs levels, most of the serious threats were against someone with the bare minimum of champion level, and thus, the heroes fought back accordingly. Agumon came across as a sort of a default placeholder form for Greymon unlike Guilmon who was able to take on Champions with or without the help of cards. Takato would have swelled in pride at this thought if he weren't so mesmerized by the ball of fire that literally erupted from his own mouth.

The Pepper Blast attack struck Kuwagamon head on in a way that resembled Guilmon's Pyro Sphere instead of Agumon's Pepper Breath. The explosion halting the beetle in its tracks and made it roar in agony. Takato began dreading what he just did thinking perhaps agitating the guy wasn't the smartest idea but was quickly relieved when it turned around and left, apparently deciding that the dinosaur wasn't worth the trouble.

Breathing a sigh of relief from being given a second chance at life, Takato's heart stopped for what seemed to be the millionth time in the hour when he heard a new voice.

"Wow, that was amazing!"

The new voice didn't sound threatening, in fact it sounded almost familiar, the name of its speaker eluding the digimon's head at the moment, but quickly rectified itself when Takato turned his head to see who it was.

The person was a boy, clearly a bit older than him. He wore a white dress shirt which was covered by a green school jacket. The set was completed with grey pants. In sharp contrast to the bland set up, his brown hair was wild and seemed to defy the laws of physics in several ways. The hair being a giveaway, it didn't take long for the stunned digimon to place the name of the new stranger.

Takato Matsuki the Agumon was staring at none other than Tai Kamiya, the leader of the digidestined.

* * *

**AN: **My first attempt at writing other than the essays and reports for school. So, how did I do? Suggestions for improvement are always welcome.


	2. Rough starts

"Wow, that was amazing!"

Takato stared at his childhood hero in shock. The digimon hadn't been awake for thirty minutes and yet he had enough surprises to send a war veteran into trauma. Luckily, Tai quickly followed up his original statement, bringing the digimon to his senses.

"You just beat a champion level digimon all by yourself. And here I thought you were a goner."

"Uh....well....technically I didn't beat him. He just sort of.... ran off."

After all the experiences he went through already, the fact that he was meeting characters on a TV show didn't really phase him. After so many mind reeling surprises, Takato just sort of took everything in stride. Yet despite this, the fanboy was clearly unable to keep himself from being bashful. He was, after all, in the presence of the leader of the chosen, the _original gogglehead_ that got him started on his own journey.

Tai, not knowing the nature of Agumon's inner turmoil, mistook the stuttering for fear.

"Don't worry, we're not here to hurt you, we were just in the area before we heard a roar and found the Kuwagamon about to delete you. Turns out you're strong enough to handle yourself."

Noticing that Tai used the term "we", Takato finally noticed the other company that was catching up to the leader. The first one being in the same green uniform but with messy blond hair, Matt Ishida bearer of the crest of friendship and his partner Gabumon not far behind. The second one also wore the school uniform although instead of pants, she had a skirt. Sora, the bearer of love and her digimon Biyomon followed soon after.

_Wait a sec. If Tai and the others are here, that means that this really is the digital world and that I'm in the TV series. That would explain why I didn't recognize anything at first. This is a different digital world._

Mentally patting himself on the back for coming onto this epiphany, Takato first noticed that Tai didn't have his digimon by his side like the others. Furthermore, while the goggleheaded tamer wasn't much of a thinker, preferring to remain optimistic and leaving all the difficult planning stuff to either Henry or Hypnos, it didn't take long to realize that with the outfits, the digidestined had not aged much past season two. Heck, it could've been during or even before it for all he knew. But then if this was the case, where was Davis and the others? After entering junior high, the older children passed on the mantle to the younger ones and hardly ever set foot in the digital world except on rare occasions. So why was three of them standing before him right now?

Once again taking the silence to be a sign that the new Agumon was afraid, Tai coughed nervously and tried to think of a way to continue the conversation. Remembering his original purpose, his voice became slightly more serious although kept its jovial edge so as not to freak out the digimon in front of him.

"So anyways, can you help us out?"

Quickly snapping out of his trance, Takato tilted his head in a way that reminded himself of Guilmon.

"Help with what?"

"You see, we're looking for one of our buddies. Actually, he's an Agumon like you. To be honest I thought that you were him when I first saw you being attacked and started panicking.... not that I don't care about you I mean-"

Tai's train of thought was brought back in line with the sound of Sora loudly clearing her throat. She gave the gogglehead a light rap on the head as punishment for digressing and then kneeled down to even the size between her and the "frightened" new Agumon.

"What this knucklehead is trying to say here is that, we can't seem to find our friend and last we heard, he was around this area. Did you happen to see him or anything?"

Tai's Agumon was missing? Rather than being worried, the rookie felt a wave of relief. The only time that Agumon went missing was when the Digimon Emperor kidnapped him with a dark ring and that certainly was no secret. The fact that Takato never heard of this event probably meant that this was past the timeline that he heard about. Good, he wouldn't have to worry about screwing up the story then.

"Uh, sorry. I can't say that I have. I'm kinda..... new around here."

"Oh? What do you mean? Don't you live in a village around here?"

For the first time, Takato realized the severity of the situation. How was he, an Agumon, supposed to tell them that his "village" was a bakery in Shinjuku. On that note, how the heck were the digidestined even here?! He briefly considered the possibility of him and the other tamers being the third generation, coming after the first two televised ones but rejected the thought quickly. Hypnos would have told them about it or at the very least, the chosen children would have shown up to fight the D-Reaper. If these guys existed, than Takato himself probably came from a completely different world, no, universe than the one these guys were used to. Would they believe him if he said that he was supposed to be a human from Shinjuku? On that thought, would they believe him if he said that he was probably from a different Earth than the one they knew?

"Erm, not really. I don't remember much actually, I have no idea where I am and I have no idea why I'm even here." Takato felt terrible about lying to his heroes, but maybe he could tell them after he understood the situation more. It was simply too much to take in at one time and he went through enough in his own adventures to realize that he couldn't just do things recklessly.

It was Matt's turn to speak up.

"Huh? You mean like you don't remember anything at all? I've never heard of a digimon getting amnesia before."

Takato just shrugged the best he could with his new shoulders.

"What about before you ended up here? Do you remember where you used to live?

Again the question was answered with a shake of his head.

Gabumon observed the conversation for a bit until he noticed something else.

"Hey, whats that symbol you got there?" He pointed at the dinosaur's over sized hand.

Confused, Takato looked down where he was pointing and sure enough, there was a symbol on his left hand. He quickly recognized the symbol as the exact same hazard sign on Guilmon's chest. He must've missed it in all the excitement upon waking up. Unfortunately, it didn't explain why the hazard symbol was on his hand right now. With an all new question stacked on top of the already impressive list, Takato searched his memories for anything that might help but came up blank. The only time the hazard even became an issue was when Guilmon digivolved to Megidramon. Takato involuntarily shuddered at the memory. During the fight, Megidramon's hazard symbol began to flash violently as though warning them of an incoming disaster, although one could say that the appearance of demonic dragon was a disaster in itself. Takato would later hear from Hypnos that the hazard symbol began corrupting computer systems at the exact same time only to have all trace of it disappear right after the incident resolved itself when Takato biomerged. After all this time, all effects of the hazard symbol disappeared, and yet here it is again on his hand.

_First Guilmon and now me. What the heck is this thing and why does it appear on all the digimon I'm involved with?_

"I have no idea", he finally responded. This time truthfully.

Coming to this specific area for answers and only to be given more questions, Tai let go of a sigh.

"Well normally I would invite you to come with us just that theirs one problem, we gotta go back to the real world and I'm not sure you would like it there. But if you do come, we can have Izzy dig up some clues on that symbol you have. My mom probably wouldn't mind you staying over either since you're pretty much identical to my own partner."

Matt and Sora nodded in confirmation, apparently having no problem with the set up and Takato found himself unusually giddy. He was getting invited over to Tai's house! In a million years Takato would never have imagined that he would have gotten this opportunity. Of course the situation was a little weirder than he hoped for but than again so was meeting Tai. When he finally answered, the human minded digimon tried not to sound too excited about the arrangement.

"I guess I don't have a problem with that. I heard some stories about the real world."

"Great! I'm Tai, my buddies over there are Matt and Sora." He pointed at each respectively. "The two digimon are their partners Gabumon and Biyomon." After pausing for a moment, he added "Hey maybe we might even be able to find you a partner after this is all over."

Takato inwardly flinched at the thought. Was it even possible for him to partner up with a human when he was naturally one?

"Well either ways, introductions aside, we're gonna do a little bit more searching around for clues before we head back. We were on our ways to other sectors to look around. I was gonna head over to the east with Matt since it's dangerous and my partners missing but since you're here, you mind coming with me to the north? It'll make the search faster."

* * *

It didn't take the former tamer to agree to the idea and each pair headed off to their respective sectors. Sora and Matt having a huge lead due to their digimon's ability to digivolve into something much faster. The goggleheaded duo, on the other hand, had to walk to their sector the old fashion way and would thus have a much shorter allotted time exploring their sector before they would have to head back.

While Takato didn't mind the walk, he noticed that his companion was abnormally silent and grew more and more impatient with every minute they spent walking to their destination. It didn't take a genius to realize that Tai was simply worried about his Agumon. This brought Takato to yet another unsolved mystery. What was going on with the chosen Agumon? From the explanation given to him during their introduction, apparently the original Agumon had vanished with out a trace near the area that Takato woke up in. Suddenly Takato felt a tinge of dread. What if this whole situation is connected? What if the same force that threw him in this situation also took Agumon? What if _he _took over the body of Agumon and the goofy dinosaur on the show was gone forever? A dozen what if situations cycled through his head as each possibility frightened him more than the last. Finally pushing the thoughts out of his head with the excuse of knowing to little, Takato looked up in time to notice that the area was changing dramatically.

"Tai, I think we're here."

Jolting out of his own inner thoughts Tai scanned the new area. It was quite similar to the last one with the exception of the ambiance seeming slightly darker. Maybe it he was just being paranoid and the sun was going down but Tai felt his hair slightly more on edge than it already was. Finally seeing an opening out of the forest, the two stepped out into the opening to find another lake, only this one seeming much bigger. The water itself was much murkier than the crystal clear water from the first one.

"I guess I should've checked up with Izzy to see what this area was like before actually coming here. This is more of a job for Joe and Gomamon unless you like swimming."

Takato nodded his head in agreement but suddenly felt his body tense. Something just didn't feel right. He instinctively lowered his body as his eyes narrowed into slits. If he wasn't so focused on an unseen threat, Takato would have noticed that he was acting the exact same way Guilmon did every time he sensed a nearby enemy digimon, although in his defense, at least he was able to restrain himself from growling.

The action did not go unnoticed by Tai. "Um, you okay buddy?"

His question was quickly answered when a Seadramon violently erupted out of the water screeching. The sudden burst let loose a wave of water to flooded the nearby area, plowing over both observers. Before either of them got a chance to assess the situation, the Seadramon quickly followed up with a swipe of his tail. While Takato was able to dodge it with help from his newfound fighting instincts, Tai wasn't as lucky and found himself launched into the lake.

"NO!" Takato's mind went into a state of frenzy. Tai was in the lake with the turbulent waves knocking him under every time he resurfaced. Unless he did something, Tai was going to drown!

"Pepper Blast!" Spitting out another fireball, Takato aimed it at Seadramon's head. The blast hit it head on and for a moment, the digimon stopped thrashing. Both human and digimon looked at the clearing smoke with frightful anticipation only to find a severely pissed off Seadramon looking back.

"Uh oh." The intimidation plan that worked so well on Kuwagamon had opposite results for this new enemy as Seadramon simply shot back with an ice blast. Takato could only stare on as the ice shards quickly made its way towards him with the intent to freeze him into a nice little cube.

"No, this can't be happening. Agumon is depending on me, both of them! I can't let it end like this." Tai's head was reeling from the adrenaline as the one sided battle was drawing to a close. In the moment, Tai felt a glow that warmed him down to his very center despite the biting cold of the water. Without a second thought, he reached up and grabbed hold of the shiny new digivice hovering over his head.


	3. New possibilities

As Tai took hold of the shining digivice, bright light erupted and consumed the entire lake. Engulfed in the new warm sensation, it wouldn't have been very hard for the boy to simply close his eyes and drift off to sleep. Of course he refrained from doing so by remembering that he was on the verge of drowning due to a psychotic digimon attack.

Looking around, the former leader of the digidestined couldn't see anything but white. There was no ground as far as he could see yet he could feel his feet stationed on something as solid as concrete. Looking down at his new gadget, Tai was in such a daze that he was almost unable to tell that this new digivice was different from all the others he saw so far. As though he were in a trance, he looked up again. In the expanse of white there was now a boy that he was sure wasn't there earlier. The boy looked about as old as Kari, had the same red eyes and messy brown hair. Oh yea definitely a lot like Kari. An interesting note was the goggles on his head that reminded Tai of his own pair before he handed them down to Davis.

He couldn't quite place it, but Tai had a feeling that he met the boy before which was strange because he would definitely remember someone with goggles on. Without even realizing why he did it, he nodded to the boy as though agreeing to some unspoken deal. The boy nodded back and as he did, another wave of warmth and comfort rushed through his body.

* * *

Takato had no doubt in his mind that he was going to die. The shards of ice wasted no time rushing towards him and he knew for a fact that there was no way he would dodge in time. Shutting his eyes tight and bracing himself for a very messy death, a surge of strength suddenly coursed throughout his veins.... or whatever the digital equivalent of bloodstreams were.

As the attack hit him, pain shot through his body and yet he was still alive. In fact, Takato never felt better as his body suddenly doubled then tripled in size. The light surrounding his skin began to fade and the former human felt the strange need to shout his new name to all those in the nearby vicinity.

Agumon digivolve to..... GREYMON!!

The newly evolved champion was using all of his willpower to not laugh at his newfound power, mostly because the sight of a giant dinosaur laughing maniacally would probably give his new partner second thoughts about teaming up...

"..... oh right, I have to save Tai." Glad that Greymon's generally didn't blush at their own stroke of stupidity, Takato focused his attention back onto his foe who was waiting patiently for the boy-digimon to make the first move.

"Alright buddy, I have no idea why your attacking us but the fields even now. Back down before things get ugly." The Seadramon replied by snorting loudly, mocking him and then splashing his tail into the water to stir up the waves again.

Tai, who was watching while calmly hovering on the surface of the lake, was suddenly reminded of his mortality once again. The resulting shout of distress forced Takato to make a quick judgement call. The Greymon ran forward and leaped into the lake, mentally slapping himself when the ensuing cannonball summoned a tsunami that dragged his human partner underwater. Takato dove after him, surprisingly mobile in the new element and managed to coil his tail around Tai before rising back up to the surface. Gingerly, he placed the sputtering teenager onto the bank who was about to nod his head in thanks only to be interrupted when Seadramon who clearly did not enjoy being ignored, fired another ice blast.

Takato dove in the path, intercepting the attack before it could hit Tai and paid for it dearly. Seadramon, seeing his opponent double over in pain, rushed over intent on tackling him and possibly dragging him down under for a watery demise.

Tai quickly regained his senses as he heard Greymon shout out. His past experiences helped hone his reflexes and allowed him recover quickly when he realized his friends were in danger. Now hopefully, he could put it to good use.

'Oh man think, think! Theres no way Greymon can take on a Seadramon in the water. Especially not after he just took a hit head on. Theres gotta be something around here- wait a moment.'

Looking down at his hand, Tai noticed that his digivice was still emitting a bright light from the screen. Finally taking note of the new device, he could see that the new digivice definitely wasn't like his old one. It was red and white and faintly resembled a fat 't' if you squinted. It had three buttons with one being noticeably larger than the other two. The screen itself had three words printed on it: Scan, Modify, and Digivolution, the last option being grayed out.

Quickly pushing the large middle button he selected the current option which happened to be Scan. The digivice immediately projected a holographic image of the Seadramon including the level, his type, and all of his attacks.

"Well that's pretty cool and all but NOT WHAT WE NEED!!!!" As if to agree with him, the Seadramon slammed into Takato full force and wrapped his tail around his leg, preparing to drag him into the water. If he succeeded, to say Greymon would be in a bad situation would be an understatement.

Meanwhile, with adrenaline pouring down his bloodstream at a horrifying rate, Tai pounded on the buttons until it returned to the previous screen. The tech genius managed to find out that the two smaller buttons were meant for scrolling through the choices while the big one was to confirm the selection. Izzy would be proud. Well actually Izzy probably would've smacked Tai for not realizing this the moment he saw it but then again everyone knew that technology wasn't exactly the Tai's forte.

Quickly scrolling down to the modify option and selecting it, a new short list popped up on the screen.

"Power boost, Speed boost, Revitalize? What the..... errr..... power boost!" Closing his eyes and dramatically hitting the confirm button, the digivice once again whirred to life.

* * *

Takato in the process of drowning on the bottom of the seabed, felt the effects immediately. Opening his eyes, he grinned before grabbing Seadramon who was currently coiled around his body trying to squeeze out what was left of his air. Wrapping his claws firmly on the serpents body, he quickly pried himself loose and followed through with a rough head butt right on Seadramon's nose. While distracted with the pain, Seadramon didn't notice his opponent charging up an attack.

"NOVA NAPALM!" True to its name the attack didn't simply unleash another fireball. Instead, one could compare it to a large flaming rock although the flaming part wasn't quite as effective underwater. Despite that, a point blank blast from dense piece of rock (or at least he thought it was a rock) was more than enough to knock out the data digimon who was previously writhing in pain.

Takato would have celebrated his first victory but he was quickly reminded of ever limited supply of air in his lungs... did digimon have lungs? "Man I really need to ask someone about these things" he thought as he scrambled up to the top for air.

Upon reaching the surface. Takato felt what was left of the energy that entered his body moments before rapidly leave. In blink of an eye, the former tamer was once again an Agumon. Slowly paddling to the shore, he was instantly picked up by his own tamer. 'Agumon' involuntarily shuddered. It was going to take some time before he could get used to the thought of being a tamed digimon. A part of him didn't want to acknowledge it and yet the digivice that was in Tai's hand confirmed it.

He could barely make out the sounds of Tai's frantic calls before letting the built up exhaustion finally take its toll and fade everything to black.

* * *

When Takato reopened his eyes, he was thoroughly agitated. The nap would have been one of the best he ever had if it weren't for the fact that something woke him before he got his fill. Someone was poking the top part of his head constantly.

"Davis, leave him alone! Can't you see he's exhausted?"

"Sorry Kari, I'm just a little curious about this weird thing on his head. I never saw it before."

"Yeah, we asked him about it earlier and he said he didn't have a clue what it was."

To which Takato gracefully responded "Mrhmmhrmm" effectively alerting everyone that he was waking up.

"Oh sorry bout waking you up little guy."

Takato slowly opened his eyes to the familiar brightness of the fluorescent lights commonly found in schools and offices, in the case the former. Slowly picking up his head to see the speaker, the digimon realized that he was surrounded by even more digidestined before. Sometime while he passed out, Tai must've taken him back to the real world, more specifically, the school computer room. Now he was surrounded by not only Tai, Matt, and Sora, but also the season two digidestined as well as Izzy who happened to be inches away from his own face with a strange, almost hungry look in his face.

That would have been the cue for the former tamer to slowly back away until he stumbled upon yet another fun fact.

He had no legs.

Sensing his distress, Kari promptly picked in-training and stepped away from Davis and Izzy whom everyone could see was currently scaring the living snot out of the poor guy. It was understandable, after all, as everyone still believed that he was a confused digimon that had never been in the presence of so many humans, let alone the real world.

Finding himself relaxing in the girls arms, Takato tried to assess the situation. Further inspecting the room, he verified that he was indeed in the computer room of his all time favorite TV series. A glance at the clock told him that it was around five-ish close to six, about the time when after school activities and clubs ended which might explain why the younger digidestined were missing in the digital world. It didn't take long to register that everything was much larger than it usually was which led him to a quick conclusion. "I'm... a Koromon?"

"Yup, things like that tend to happen when we hop over to the real world" Tai said as he walked over to his sisters side and gave Takato a pat on the head. "You had me worried there for a sec."

Looking up, Koromon saw Tai's smile and melted with relief. Unfortunately it didn't last long as the unconditional sensation ironically increased the in-training's anxiety.

'Something's wrong here' Takato thought to himself. 'I shouldn't be caring this much for Tai. I mean, I always liked him in the show and I would never want anything bad to happen to him but this is the sort of feeling I get when I'm in more personal situations. Like if mom or dad was in trouble.'

Sneaking another look at his tamer who was still wearing a nonchalant grin, it suddenly made sense. Tai was his tamer now, of course he would feel the need to protect him at all costs. Was this what happened to all digimon that partnered up? Takato filed away that train of thought for later, there were more pressing things at hand.

After a long pause, everyone apparently gauging his reaction, he finally spoke up. "Uhh, so what's up?"

Blinking, Izzy scanned the Koromon for what seemed like the millionth time since his arrival. While the puffball seemed to be terrified at first, he recovered surprisingly well in a span of ten seconds. Maybe digimon just liked being held by Kari, who knows?

"Well after you passed out, I carried you back to a TV set, umm we use those to get back to the real world by the way. It's been about thirty minutes since you've been out and we're waiting on Izzy to finish some tests on the new digivice."

Finally getting a clear look at the digivice hooked up to the computer, Takato noticed that the digivice was almost the same as his own, right down to the coloring. The difference being that there wasn't a card reader on the side which made sense considering that this world didn't have cards.

"Izzy's the redhead over here that was giving you scary looks" Matt joked, playfully nudging said Braniac.

"Knock it off Matt, I was just observing him to see if there were anymore changes other than that symbol on his head."

That would explain why they were poking him when he was sleeping.

"Well either ways, this new digivice you have is really amazing, it has a bunch of new capabilities including one that lets you scan and store information on all the digimon you meet. Don't even get me started on this new modify function. From what I gather from your story, you can actually use your digivice to boost Koromon's abilities from afar without having him digivolve. Furthermore, with some probing I found an integrate function."

Looking up and seeing the blank stares he was getting, he decided to rephrase that. "Err basically it combines the scan and modify functions and actually allows your digimon to use moves from data that you stored on the digivice. So for example, the only digimon you scanned so far was Seadramon, I bet that next time you fight, you can probably get Koromon to use an Ice Blast attack or something.

That earned a collective gasp from the audience.

"Woah, so your saying that Tai can do all these cool new moves now?" Davis said with a hint of jealousy in his eyes. "Aww man, I want one, can you imagine me and Veemon pulling off some of Angemon's moves? I bet Veemon's Hand of Fate is better than the original" he said, clearly challenging his friend.

Provoked, Patamon hopped off his customary spot on TK's head while TK merely rolled his eyes and grabbed the rookie before he could do something stupid. "The important question here, is why he got the new digivice. I mean like, the only time new digivice show up is when theres another threat to the digital world and when that happens, normally several new digivices show up and go to a bunch of younger kids. No offense to you of course Tai" he quickly added on.

Wheeling himself back to the desk, Izzy picked up the digivice and looked it over again. "Well so far, this thing is one of a kind and from the attacks that happened on Tai, Matt, and Sora, we can tell that something is riling up all the digimon."

So Matt and Sora got attacked too?

"Well anyways, there isn't any appearance of a large threat so we can only wait and see what happens. I'll keep an eye out for anything strange and I'm going to need to keep this digivice a little longer if that's alright with you Tai."

Takato didn't know why he did it, but he cut Tai off before he could respond. "It's called a D-ark".

"Huh?"

"The digivice is called a D-ark". Truthfully, Takato wasn't sure whether or not it could still be considered a D-ark with its new modifications but it was simply too similar to the model he once held for him to call it anything else.

A thought popped into his head. Rika and Henry! How could he forget!? They might still be stuck in the digital world. As he was about to open his mouth to shout it out, he suddenly realized there wasn't many ways to tell the other digidestined about his missing friends without letting them know of the entire situation.

"Umm excuse me."

"It's alright you can call me Izzy."

"Err alright Izzy, I think I left some friends behind in the digital world."

"You remember? Are you starting to get back all your memories?"

"Well, actually, I'm not. I just remember that they might be there."

"Might?"

Oh boy, this was going to be harder than he thought. Furiously working his brain to come up with an excuse and conveniently passing it up as trying to regain his memories, Takato worked the gears in his now oversized head-body when suddenly, it dawned on him.

"Oh yeah, I do remember something! I don't come from this place."

"Sorry to burst your bubble little guy, but we already told you that. This is the real world." Davis interjected.

"No no, I don't mean the real world, I meant in the digital world. I'm from another quadrant."

Izzy's eyebrow perked up. "Quadrant?"

"Yeah, I heard that the digital world is supposed to be divided into different quadrants, each ruled by a different Soverei- Harmonious One. Mines is the Southern Quadrant ruled by Zhuqiaomon." Takato patted himself on the back for his unbelievably quick thinking. Never in a million years would he have pictured himself creating such an elaborate story despite the fact that most of it was from the truth or so he gathers. The idea of him lying so much in such a short span of time, however, brought him down again.

'I'll tell them after I come up with a decent way to explain all this. If I'll ever be able to explain all this.' He thought to himself.

"Prodigious! I heard from Azulongmon about the different quadrants but this is the first time we ever encountered something that's more than just a theory. Do you remember anything else? Maybe how you got across, or who your friends look like?"

".... no sorry, I don't remember anything else. My friends might not have crossed over at all for all I know."

"Oh... I see. Well it's alright. At least now we have something."

"Wait Izzy." Tai started with a worried look in his face. "If I have a new partner and everything, does that mean that Agumon....."

"Sorry Tai, we still know too little to start guessing on what happened to Agumon. All we can do is keep looking."

Cody, who remained an observer this entire time, suddenly spoke up. "Tai I know that your worried right now but maybe we should hold off the search for tomorrow. It's starting to get late and our parents would worry if we don't start heading home."

With a sigh, Tai agreed.

Takato looked up worriedly at his new tamer. The new bond that they shared was definitely taking its toll. Whatever mood swings that Tai felt, he felt as well and right now that meant that he felt a mixture of anxiety and depression.

Noticing his partner's distress, Tai bent down and gave another reassuring pat to him. "Sorry about that, I didn't mean that I didn't want you or anything, you saved my butt back th-"

"No its OK, your just worried about your friend."

Leaping over from her spot on the windowsill, Gatomon strolled over and hopped onto Kari's shoulder, looking down at the newcomer.

"Well lets head home then. If we're gonna be sharing the same room, I'm gonna be laying down some ground rules."

The others began to disperse after saying their goodbyes. Giggling as Gatomon grilled the Koromon in all the do's and don'ts, mostly don'ts, Kari began the trek back home with the two digimon and her brother in tow. Koromon sighed.

It was going to be a long night.


	4. Accomplice

"Alright spit it out already."

"Huh?"

Gatomon sighed. "Don't play dumb with me. Who are you really?"

It had been awhile since the meeting in the computer lab. After introducing Takato to their room, Tai and Kari made a quick apology and promise to sneak some food in before heading off to a very late dinner and possible scolding from their mother. Takato himself found himself comfortably snuggled into the pillow on Tai's bed, dazedly reflecting upon the events on the passed day before he was suddenly reminded of his other roommate.

Takato had always admired Gatomon's behavior while watching her through the TV screen. A mixture of spunk and feistiness one would expect from a cat as well as experience from being a champion and former servant of a the dreaded Myotismon secured her place as the most serious and perceptive of the group of digimon while they were back at home. Well, overall, it didn't really mean much when the "group of digimon" were a bunch of hyperactive in trainings that could scarf down a buffet in two seconds. Somehow, Takato appreciated her perceptiveness better when he wasn't the one being studied.

Soon after the two human residents left for their food, Gatomon leapt onto the opposite end of the bed with her eyes fixed upon the newcomer.

The pink puffball began sweating profusely. '_How did she know? I thought I was doing so well too._' Trying to pull out yet another miraculous fib, Takato stammered a bit before he was cut off.

"You know, you're actually a really bad liar. The way you get all nervous and scrunched up before you talk is a clear sign of it. The others might think that its just you "adjusting" and what not but I can tell the difference."

Gatomon paused a sec to see how the Koromon was taking all the information and was pleased with herself when she saw clear signs of him breaking down. _'Wow he's an even worse at this than I thought.'_

Seeing as he still wasn't talking, the feline gave one more push. "Also the way you act in the real world is suspicious too. If I had a bit of catnip for every disaster story I heard about new digimon entering the real world, I would have enough to be a very happy Gatomon for the rest of my life. You on the other hand didn't react to anything. Not to the cars, the TV's and who knows what other weird things these humans need. Heck even I got scared of the train when I first saw it."

Takato could've sworn he heard Rika's voice calling him a 'stupid gogglehead' for being seen through so easily but shrugged it off. Now is no time to argue with voices inside his head. To tell the truth, Takato was considering the idea of just blurting everything out to whoever he could find but immediately shrugged it off. It wouldn't do to have the leader of the digidestined think he had an insane digimon under his roof. Realizing that Gatomon was getting impatient from his lack of a response, Takato caved in. Well if he had to tell someone, Gatomon was probably as good as any, being the most level headed out of all the digimon, she could probably understand.... hopefully. And besides, it would be nice to get rid of some of this weight. Slowly, he tried to find the best words to let loose the situation gently.

"Would you.....errr....believe that...."

"Yea?"

"Well.... actually.... I didn't actually lose my memory....."

Gatomon raised an eyebrow. Finally her suspicions were confirmed. She was getting somewhere.

"And well.... well it's kinda complicate-"

"Spit it out already you dork. Jeez, you're slower than a Numemon."

"I USED TO BE A HUMAN!" Takato froze. He hadn't meant to blurt it out like that, but with all the pressure he was getting, he couldn't help it.

Gatomon blinked. This was not part of her suspicions. "Come again?"

"I'm actually a human from Shinjuku. I went to sleep one night and when I woke up, I was suddenly an Agumon in the digital world." There the truth was out, well not all of it, but Takato would have to wait for the first bit to process.

To Gatomon's credit, she didn't seem shocked. She simply sat there contemplating what she just heard. Or maybe she was considering whether or not to throw the crazy mon out the window. Takato hoped it was the former.

"So lemme get this straight, you used to be a human."

"Y-yes." he stammered in response.

"And then you suddenly woke up as a digimon before we found you?"

"Y-y-yes mam." Oh great now he was getting nervous enough to throw out formalities.

"And why exactly were you turned into a digimon?"

"I d-dunno, I didn't have any time to figure that out. I was still learning how to... like walk and stuff when the Kuwagamon attacked and Tai found me."

Gatomon began pacing around the bed, to Takato she resembled a tiger as it circled around its cornered prey, decided whether or not the slab of meat in front of it was worth eating.

"How do you know about digimon? Even if what you say is true, you know way too much for a normal human ending up in a situation like that. Are you one of the other digidestined?"

"Yea.... you can say that." After pausing for a brief second, Takato added. "Can you not tell the other digidestined about this? I didn't tell them to begin with because I didn't want them thinking I was crazy or anything. I mean I will eventually, just give me some more time to figure out what the heck is going on so I can explain things better to them."

Gatomon relaxed a bit. She quickly concluded that the little guy was definitely not anything dangerous. If it were a spy or an evil digimon, they would be behaving more professional, more like.... well.... her when she was still on the evil side. He was a bit too much of a klutz to be sent out on dastardly missions like that. Either that or he was a extraordinarily good actor. Looking him over one more time, she quickly settled on her first choice. She sighed. There were a couple more plot holes that she could tell he was trying to cover up, but she could always grill him for that later.

"Alright, I won't tell them just yet but on one condition."

Takato let out a breath he didn't realize he was holding and eagerly nodded for her to continue.

"You let me in on everything that's going on with you. Things have been getting boring around here lately and I could use the excitement." Her eyes narrowed a bit before she continued. "But that doesn't mean I'm gonna let Kari get into any dangerous situation that I can stop beforehand. Got it?"

Takato jumped up and down in an attempt to nod vigorously. Despite the threat, he felt much better now that he got through that ordeal in one piece. Gatomon took the moment to jump off the bed and towards the phone in their room before picking it up and dialing a number. As if predicting his apprehension she spoke up.

"Oh calm down. I told you I wasn't going to tell any digidestined, but that leaves digimon fair game.

For some reason that didn't make him feel any better but then Gatomon continued as the phone started making a dial tone. "Oh relax would ya? I'm not stupid. DemiVeemon might have good intentions but he couldn't keep a secret for his life. I'm just gonna let Patamon know. We can trust him to keep his mouth sh -- oh hey TK, lemme speak to Patamon for a bit."

Koromon could barely hear the whispers that Gatomon was saying over the phone but he could vaguely make out the words 'tomorrow' and 'during school'. She suddenly sped up her whispers and hung up very abruptly. Before Takato could ask her the reason for her change in tempo, the door opened to show Tai and Kari both holding a bowl of food for their respective digimon.

"Sorry we couldn't get you guys more but our dad ate part of our portions as punishment for being late."

Kari rolled her eyes. "Oh please Tai, dad's just a pig. And you wonder where you got the genes for that over sized stomach of yours."

Tai chuckled and rubbed the back of his head before heading to his bed. "Well our mom isn't the best cook, but it should be better than whatever you can scrounge up on the digital world. I'll get you some snacks later since _someone _ ate our entire stash." he said while glaring at the perpetrator in an obvious fashion.

Gatomon responded by whistling and hopping to her customary spot on the windowsill.

The in training chuckled quietly to himself as Tai picked him up and placed him onto the desk next to the plate of food. Takato was about to look for a pair of chopsticks to eat it with before realizing that he had no arms. He stared at his bowl blankly trying to figure out how he could eat it without slobbering over himself. Gatomon observing him while chowing down on her own portion, had practically choked on her food when realizing his dilemma.

"Oh come on, our mom's cooking isn't that bad.... is it?"

Gatomon wasted no time cashing in on her new found information.

Hopping next to him, she gave him a conspiratorial nudge on the gut while chuckling. "Yeah come on Koromon. The other digimon would have _dived_ in head first by now. Or maybe you forgot how to eat too."

Takato glared back at her, fully aware that she was enjoying his pain. Taking another brief look at the grub and noticing his sudden hunger pains, he decided to swallow his pride. _'Just do it like Guilmon does. He always made food look so much better whenever he ate his food like that. _After the brief mental pep talk, the puffball quite literally jumped into the bowl headfirst, chomping on whatever morsel his mouth encountered and given the large size of his mouth, it happened to be a lot. He silently thanked the digigods for designing Koromons to not have a neck or he would quite likely have choked on the sheer amount of food being crammed down his mouth at once.

Tai and Kari stared wide eyed at the speed their new friend ate the food with while Gatomon clutched her stomach laughing at how awkward he looked trying to devour all that food at once. He practically swallowed his food whole.

Kari tsked her partner as Gatomon continued to laugh hysterically at digimon's expense who was now visibly red from embarrassment even under all the bits of food on his face. Ignoring her partner, Kari picked up a spare napkin that she brought in and began cleaning Koromon's face with it.

"Wow I didn't realize you were that hungry or I would have saved you some more to eat."

Still blushing from his embarrassment, Takato politely stuttered, "N-no its ok. Thanks for the food."

Kari stifled a giggle. With his unnaturally high voice, Koromon sounded like a little boy being overly polite to a grown up stranger.

Bounding up from his spot on the bed, Tai picked him up and held him close to his own face. "No need to be so stiff Koromon. We're all buddies now right?" Takato slowly nodded. "Great, then as your new friend, lemme introduce you to what we enjoy doing on our free time."

Before anyone even had the chance to reply, Tai hauled him away to the living room. Kari and Gatomon stood watching them as they quickly went out the door.

Gatomon, who's lips were still quivering from the laughter, silently bounded over to Kari. "Welp, looks like Tai is gonna introduce Koromon to the exciting world of television and soccer programs."

"Really, I can't believe Tai sometimes. I was going to show him around the house and explain how things work here. The poor guy probably doesn't even know what a TV is."

"Oh I'm sure he'll catch on quick. You give us mon too little credit sometimes Kari. Besides we have TVs in the digital world too remember? He'll handle it fine."

"I guess... but still, it couldn't hurt to help ease him into this sort of thing. Well at least tomorrow, he'll be around the other digimon and hopefully they'll help him feel more at home."

Gatomon looked away from her, hiding a devious smirk on her face. "Oh yea. I'll make sure that he fits right in with the rest of us tomorrow."

Kari couldn't help but feel a hint of malice in what the feline just said but quickly brushed it off. Gatomon knew better than to victimize someone like that.

Gatomon leapt back over to her spot on the bed and settled in for a quick cat nap. After all, she would need her rest if she wanted to effectively torment the newcomer tomorrow during school. If the guy was a nervous wreck now, imagine what would happen if he had to spend a day with the others.

If Kari hadn't been distracted with starting her homework she might have heard the faint sounds of her partner's maniacal giggling.


End file.
